Artwork from Alan Neider

With the ‘IKEA Paintings’ I feel I am pushing the boundaries of what constitutes a ‘painting’.

The non-traditional materials utilized in this series - moving blankets, fabrics and deconstructed clothing create highly texture and difficult surfaces in which to paint.     

The ten paintings in this series explore how paint in various viscosities react to the variety of sewn fabrics. Further, I am interested in the expressive action that happens when big painted shapes clash and often crash into one another. Since the paintings are large scale they allow for a ‘visual dialogue’ to occur in the paintings through successive layers of paint, drips, and many color shifts as well as the mistakes.

This series is held together by the fact that an IKEA shopping bag is sewn into each painting - near the bottom. Also, the dark blue quilted blankets are always sewn on top of the gray flannel blankets.